Page:Ramtanu Lahiri, Brahman and Reformer - A History of the Renaissance in Bengal.djvu/103

 Vedas, the Vedantas, the Gita, and the Puranas were unknown to the pandits of the time.

However, people, especially the inhabitants of Calcutta, soon felt the necessity of giving their sons some education in English. They were sharp enough to see that familiarity with this language would shortly be the only passport to respectable positions; and the establishment of English schools was eagerly desired by them. But who was to respond to their wishes? Not the Government at first, but the Christian missionaries, Carey, Marshman, and Ward, who, under the auspices of the Danish Governor at Serampur, had there begun their labour of love. They started English schools among the people with whom they came into contact.

We should here allude to the encouragement given by Lord Wellesley to the improvement of Bengali literature. In 1800, with the object of giving to young civilians from Haileybury College a tolerable knowledge of Bengali, so essential to them, he established the College of Fort William. But there were then no good text-books in the language. This he felt, and requested some of the Sanskrit scholars of the day to remove the want; and at his instance Dr Carey wrote his Bengali Grammar and Mritanjoy Vidyalankar, Ramram Bose, Haraprosad Rai, Rajib Lochan, and Chandi Charan Munshi, several works in Bengali prose. These works were studied from 1800 to 1818. But they were not specimens of chaste Bengali; for, the language not having a copious vocabulary then, there were too many Persian words in them.

The Fort William College is no longer in existence, but it has still a sacred place in our memory, being associated with Iswara Chandra Vidyasagara, who was a teacher there for some time, and who wrote for its use the